IOL은 Alice Huang과, 미국-중국 AI 칩 조사의 중심에 선 싱가포르의 베일에 싸인 기술 기업을 조명했다.

Singapore-based tech group Megaspeed dealt in billions of dollars' worth of the world's most advanced AI chips, but its office was an empty shell when AFP visited. Its staff seemed to have vanished long before claims of espionage landed at their door.

Megaspeed's former director Alice Huang was this week outed as an alleged Chinese spy, accused of having an affair with Nvidia co-founder Jensen Huang while digging up company secrets for Beijing.

Details about Alice Huang's life are vague, making it almost impossible to pin down where she lives, where she works, or when she was born. Her influence, however, spreads far and wide, from the nondescript Singapore office to hulking data centres in Southeast Asia and the gleaming boardrooms of Silicon Valley. Her connection to cloud computing firm Megaspeed sits at the centre of the scandal.

Megaspeed presents itself as a company at the heart of the AI revolution, using Nvidia's advanced silicon chips to power high-performance computing inside vast data centres. It is also under investigation for a murkier purpose. Under the guise of buying computer hardware for its Southeast Asia data hubs, Megaspeed has allegedly helped Beijing skirt trade restrictions by sending Nvidia chips into China.

Beijing has denied allegations of spying. Megaspeed said it is investigating whether it has complied with export controls on the sensitive chips.

At Megaspeed's office in the heart of the Singapore business district, no staff could be seen behind its locked glass doors. Neighbours told AFP they had not seen anyone come or go for the past few months. Likewise, in a mall in a newly developed neighbourhood in Johor, the Malaysian region a bridge away from Singapore, no employees were around at subsidiary Speedmatrix's office.

Singapore police opened an investigation in February 2025 into Megaspeed and several other companies suspected of circumventing or violating export controls. Alice Huang was interviewed as part of the probe. Although no charges were laid, she was barred from the city-state in February 2026 for providing inaccurate information to "downplay her role in Megaspeed," Singapore's home ministry said.

**Explosive growth**

Corporate records show Huang's direct involvement in the birth of Megaspeed. A company linked to her acquired the Singapore arm of Chinese video game developer 7Road International in early 2023, the records show. Almost immediately, the 7Road name was dropped and the company became Megaspeed International.

Huang was listed as a Megaspeed director for less than a year, from March to November 2023. Her arrival coincided with a drastic change in fortunes, as Megaspeed pivoted from a little-known video game maker to one of Asia's biggest buyers of Nvidia chips. Within 12 months, its revenue jumped from $0 to almost US$300 million (R5 billion), according to company accounts filed in 2024. Over the same period, the value of its assets rose from $32 million to almost $3 billion.

Megaspeed, which describes itself as a "cloud hosting services provider," reportedly traded upwards of $4 billion worth of Nvidia chips over two years. A single one of Nvidia's advanced AI computer chips can cost tens of thousands of dollars.

A financial trail running through Singapore, Malaysia and the Cayman Islands suggests Megaspeed's business may have been boosted by a connection to Chinese tech giant Alibaba. A Malaysian Megaspeed subsidiary struck a deal in 2024, pledging assets to Apex Enterprise Solutions in Singapore as security in case of contractual breaches. Singapore corporate data shows that Apex is linked through a parent company to Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, a firm registered in the Cayman Islands.

By then, Huang was no longer registered as a director of Megaspeed, but Singapore authorities said she remained one of its "key controllers."

Megaspeed's ultimate holding company is a Singapore firm called Swiftdata. Singapore businessman Tan Yong Pong, who has previously run printing and graphic design companies, is a director of both Megaspeed and Swiftdata.

No one answered when AFP visited Tan's registered address in eastern Singapore, although dogs could be heard barking behind the door. "They are friendly. I occasionally bump into the lady at the lift landing when she's walking her dog," an elderly neighbour told AFP. "But we have not seen them for months."

**Awkward questions**

In June 2025, US investigators arrived at Megaspeed to carry out a "post-shipment verification," with Huang present, according to Singapore's home ministry. The ministry said it was the first time it learned of Washington's probe. That same day, Huang was interviewed by Singapore police, who impounded her passport.

By then, she and Nvidia boss Jensen Huang had already been spotted together in public. They were seen mingling at an afterparty following the Computex trade show in Taiwan in early 2024.

Trump was briefed on intelligence findings about their relationship well before it became a public scandal, but has said he did not regret not acting on it. "No, I don't think so. I think -- you know, he's an honorable guy," Trump said.

The scandal has nonetheless sparked national security fears. China and the United States are competing for supremacy in artificial intelligence, and Nvidia's market-leading products have become a major point of contention. Nvidia controls an estimated 90% of the market for chips used to train and run AI models, and the US imposed rules in 2022 restricting their sales to China. In recent years, Jensen Huang has emerged as the leading tech boss urging Trump to lift those curbs.

The restrictions appear to have been widely circumvented in any case. Procurement notices from October and September show that a Chinese university tied to the nation's defence establishment was able to buy advanced Nvidia chips.

Singapore's probe into Megaspeed is ongoing. Separately, Malaysia said on Friday it is investigating subsidiary Speedmatrix to determine whether chips imported into the country had been exported to other jurisdictions. Megaspeed has retained a US law firm to examine its compliance. "Megaspeed takes its compliance obligations under US export control laws extremely seriously," it said.

**Tangled webs**

Alice Huang sits at the centre of a corporate web connected to numerous shell companies, investment houses and major Chinese technology firms. Corporate records filed in Hong Kong list her as a director of Nanjing Lingxing Technology, which operates the popular T3 ride-hailing platform in China. Other notable investors in Nanjing Lingxing Technology include Alibaba and Tencent, as well as state-backed carmakers such as China FAW and Dongfeng Motor Group.

A corporate CV published by a Chinese investment firm details Huang's rapid rise through Asian investment banking. It claims she held a senior role at HSBC around 2012 before moving on to stints at CITIC Securities and Shanghai Hexi Investment. Singapore business filings describe her as a Chinese citizen with a Hong Kong passport. She was born in China's landlocked Hunan province and left to study media in Hong Kong, HK01 media reported. A CCTV reporter wrote on Weibo that she had worked with Huang at the Chinese broadcaster, but later deleted the post.